In his speech at the Democratic Convention on Monday, New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker criticized Republican nominee Donald Trump for, among other things, “cruelly mock[ing] a journalist’s disability” and the “twisted hypocrisy” of treating “other women in a manner he would never, ever accept from another man speaking about his daughters or his wife.”
Sen. Cory Booker’s remarks drew a predictable response from Trump on Twitter:
If Cory Booker is the future of the Democratic Party, they have no future! I know more about Cory than he knows about himself.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 26, 2016
On Tuesday, Booker publicly responded to Trump’s tweet on CNN’s “New Day.”
“I love Donald Trump,” Booker said. “I don’t want to answer his hate with hate. I’m going to answer it with love. I’m not going to answer his darkness with darkness.”
But Sen. Booker wasn’t very loving toward the GOP standard bearer in New York’s Central Park last weekend.
“To have a person who’s running for president who’s saying outrageous things like let’s go back to torture, or let’s have a religious test to get into this country—that is so offensive, so anti-American, it is a surrender before our enemy and undermines the truth of who we are,” Sen. Booker said at the OZY Fusion Festival.
Speaking on the threat of ISIS both domestically and abroad, Booker said: “I think our enemies should make us stronger in our America, not weaker. Donald Trump is a fall to weakness and is an assault on American values.”
Putting it a nicer way, Sen. Booker said Trump is not the person who “best embodies the leadership we need to go far together.”
Sen. Booker was interviewed by Carlos Watson, CEO of digital news site OZY. In addition to Trump, the two discussed topics ranging from incarceration rates in the U.S., to gender equality, the Black Lives Matter movement and rebuilding America’s infrastructure.
At the close of the interview, Watson shouted, “Booker 2024 for president!” Marking yet another time in recent weeks the 47-year old politician’s potential political future has been the topic of speculation. Sen. Booker’s name was was floated for Clinton’s VP pick, but on Saturday Booker applauded Tim Kaine, Hillary Clinton’s VP pick, calling him a, “guy of extraordinary character.”